The door opens.
Today is the day –
The day of the decisions. The decisions that will determine the dispute –
The day the Jew is nowhere to be seen.
Neil Fontaine knocks again on the double-doors of the Jew’s suite on the fourth floor of Claridge’s. Neil Fontaine unlocks the doors and enters the suite. He walks across the deep carpet. He pulls back the heavy curtains –
The Jew’s bed is bare. The sheets wrenched. The blankets perverted.
Neil Fontaine walks across the deep carpet to the bathroom door –
The deep, damp carpet.
Neil Fontaine stands in the stain outside the bathroom and bangs upon the door –
Neil Fontaine kicks in the door.
The Jew lies naked on the tiles of his bathroom on the fourth floor of Claridge’s.
Neil Fontaine wraps his waxen body in the monogrammed towels and holds him –
The Jew opens his eyes. He looks up at Neil. The Jew asks, ‘Did we win, Neil?’
‘There’s good news and there’s bad,’ says Neil Fontaine.
‘The bad news first, please, Neil.’
‘It did happen,’ says Neil Fontaine. ‘NACODS have voted to strike.’
The Jew nods. The Jew wipes the tears from his eyes. The Jew sniffs –
‘And the good news?’ he asks. ‘You did say there was some good news?’
‘Don and Derek are outside with Piers and Dominic,’ says Neil Fontaine.
The Jew sniffs again. The Jew squeezes his nose between his fingers and nods –
‘The show must go on, Neil,’ he says. ‘The show. Must. Go. On!’
Neil Fontaine goes back out into the corridor. He asks the four men to step inside. Tells them the Jew is feeling a little under the weather.
‘Maybe we can cheer him up,’ says Derek Williams.
‘Let’s hope so,’ says Neil Fontaine and opens the door for them.
Piers Harris and Dominic Reid lead the way. Don and Derek follow –
The Jew is sitting on the settee in his dressing-gown. The Jew says, ‘Welcome.’
Neil Fontaine sits the four men down. Neil Fontaine takes their orders –
Two gin and tonics. Two pints of bitter –
‘And a brandy for me,’ says the Jew. ‘A large one, please, Neil.’
The Jew turns to the men. His men. He says, ‘What news from the Inns of Court.’
‘The strike is unlawful in Derbyshire and unofficial in Yorkshire,’ says Piers.
Dominic nods. He says, ‘The judge did not order a ballot, though.’
‘Did the Union attend?’ asks the Jew.
Piers shakes his head. He says, “Their lawyer said they’d overlooked it.’
The Jew looks at Don and Derek. He asks, ‘Will you go to work on Monday?’
Derek looks at Don. Don looks at Derek –
Don and Derek both nod.
The Jew smiles at Don and Derek. The Jew looks at his watch. The Jew says, ‘Let’s see what Arthur Stalin has to say about that, then. Neil, the television, please.’
Neil Fontaine walks over to the TV. He switches on the Channel 4 News–
There he is. Bold as brass. Their president –
The Jew smiles. He picks up the remote control. He presses record on the video –
‘— I’m going to say this quite clearly: any miner in this Union and any official in this Union who urges or crosses a picket line in defiance of our Union’s instructions runs the risk of being disciplined. There is no High Court judge going to take away the democratic right of our Union to deal with internal affairs —’
The Jew presses stop. The Jew claps. The Jew applauds –
The Union would not accept the court’s decision. The Union insisted the strike was official –
Don Colby and Derek Williams would be scabs. Official.
The Jew looks over at Don and Derek again –
Don and Derek sitting on the fourth floor of Claridge’s with their two pints of bitter –
The Jew says, ‘That’s not very nice, is it?’
Don and Derek shake their heads and sip their pints of bitter.
The Jew looks over at Piers and Dominic with their two gin and tonics –
The Jew says, ‘That’s not strictly legal, either, is it?’
Piers and Dominic shake their heads and sip their gin and tonics.
The Jew looks at the four men and their four drinks –
The Jew says, ‘That’s contempt, isn’t it?’
The four men nod their heads.
The Jew laughs. The Jew claps his hands. The Jew shouts, ‘Champagne, Neil.’
Don and Derek smile and drain their two pints of bitter –
Piers and Dominic frown and put down their gin and tonics –
‘Might it not be rather tricky to actually serve a writ on them?’ asks Dominic.
The Jew shakes his head. The Jew winks. The Jew raises his brandy glass –
‘Piers, get me the writ,’ he shouts. ‘Neil, get me the helicopter.’
The Jew buries his brandy in one. The Jew picks up the telephone –
‘Hi-ho. Hi ho,’ sings the Jew. ‘It’s back to work we all go.’
*
Diane picked Terry Winters up after the Executive. Terry watched her legs as she drove. Diane took the A630 to Doncaster. Terry touched her knees as she drove. Diane passed through Rotherham. Terry squeezed her legs as she drove. Diane came to Conisbrough. Terry put his hands up her skirt as she drove. Diane turned left by Warmsworth Primary. Terry put his hands between her legs as she drove. Diane parked in Levitthagg Wood. Terry pulled down her tights and knickers. Diane pulled up her skirt. Terry undid his trousers. Diane undid her blouse. Terry took out his cock. Diane straddled Terry Winters. Terry was going to be late for his meeting with Mohammed Abdul Divan.
The Mechanic had seen him once before. In 1975 —
A recruitment meeting at a Heathrow hotel.
General William Walters doesn’t remember the Mechanic. But the Mechanic remembers him –
The Apprehensive Patriot –
The former NATO Commander-in-Chief Allied Forces, Northern Command. Friend of the late Lord Mountbatten. Templerof Malaya –
The Duke of Edinburgh.
Founder or member of Red Alert/Civil Assistance. Royal Society of St George. The Unison Committee for Action. Great Britain 1975. Aims of Industry. Self-Help. Movement for True Industrial Democracy. National Association for Freedom –
Philip for President.
The General’s man pours the malts. His man serves them. His man leaves them.
The General raises his glass. He says, ‘One of Frank’s boys in Ulster, I hear.’
‘Yes, sir,’ the Mechanic says.‘I was, sir.’
‘Imagine you must have spent some time in the Darklands, then.’
‘Yes, sir,’ the Mechanic says again. ‘Rhodesia, sir.’
‘Bloody mess,’ says the General. ‘Bloody mess. What do you do now?’
‘I rob supermarkets and threaten striking miners, sir.’
The General nods. He gets up slowly. He turns to his window and his local view–
Lock Linnhe. Lismore Island. Kingairloch. The Sound of Mull.
‘Never really cared for her much,’ says the General. ‘Problem was she was always Airey’s girl. Better than Queen Teddy and all those other sausage jockeys. Butstill much toofond of the clipped-cockbrigade for my liking –
‘Poor woman has had bad advice. In love with the sound of her own voice now. Thatcherism. Reaganism. Monetarism. Load of tosh-ism. Forms of Socialism in disguise. End up selling us all down the river for a few votes from the council houses. Not a government, they’re a cabal. Bunch of bloody Jews who can’t keep their filthy hands to themselves. Plain greedy, the lotof them. That’s their problem. Mines should be owned by the government. Gas, water and electricity. Like the army and the police. Privatize this. Privatize that. End up with the whole bloody country owned by foreigners. Crush Communism, trample down trade unionism. By all means. Of course, you do –